


Crossroads

by LittleAprilFlowers



Category: Borderlands (Video Games), Tales From The Borderlands (Video Games)
Genre: Big Bang Challenge, Borderlands Big Bang, Borderlands: Tales from the Borderlands, Canon-Typical Violence, F/F, F/M, Implied Relationships, Post Tales, Post-Canon, Shitty Pop Culture References, Vault Hunting, Vault of the Traveler
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-06
Updated: 2017-12-06
Packaged: 2019-02-09 08:46:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 12
Words: 16,390
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12884259
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LittleAprilFlowers/pseuds/LittleAprilFlowers
Summary: Set after Rhys and Fiona reach out for what they think is the treasure of a lifetime in the Vault of the Traveler, our two heroes instead find themselves separated from their friends. How will they get home? And how will they even figure out where they are in the first place? Meanwhile Sasha and Vaughn search for their lost companions - and face a few trials of their own.All relationships are implied unless they are canonically confirmed. I wrote this as part of the Borderlands Big Bang of 2017. Enjoy!Keep an eye out for artwork based on this fic from my partner in this Big Bang business, by Sanzo. Find their blog with their fabulous art here - http://sanzosin.tumblr.com/I can now admit publicly that my fic was inspired by one piece of their art in the first place. Seems fate brought us together.





	1. The Gala

_Not a hair out of place. You don’t brush up half bad, Rhys.’_

_‘Why thank you, Rhys! Gotta look my best for our big day.’_

_‘You sure do, Rhys. The suit suits you.’_

_‘Haha. Thanks again, Rhys.’_

_‘You’re welcome, Rhys. Own it out there, big man.’_

Rhys admires his visage in the mirror, his expression shifting from a pout and then to a grin before giving his reflection a congratulatory wink and finger gun.

At last, he had done it. Atlas was finally taking off for the second time in its history; sponsors were practically clamoring to shove their inherited dollars in his welcoming pockets. His products flew off the shelves faster than they could be made in most places on Pandora and beyond. It looks like all that training in different branches of Hyperion over the years has finally paid off – stints in advertising, data mining, several weeks in technological research, his last position in middle management… The maintenance of his own enhancements over the years had helped too, of course.

Rhys had become a real Jack-of-all-trades; master-of-none, though often better than a master-of-one, as the saying goes.

 _Jack_. Not a name he wants in his head right now.

Rhys clears his throat and ushers away the intrusive thoughts of that maniacal ghost still rattling around in his brain; instead turning to the door wearing his best game face and venturing out into the party awaiting him beyond it.

Hosting the Atlas Anniversary Gala in the facility’s jungle was proving to be a excellent idea right off the bat. Many of the guests oohed and aahed at the astounding variety of luminous flora on display. Rhys had thought beforehand to store the man-eating and/or poisonous ones away in advance. Although he doesn’t exactly remember how he managed to do so… It doesn’t matter. Tonight is his night.

His eyes scan across the assembled people around him - some of whom raise their drinks and give him appreciative looks and nods - Rhys notes a few faces he recalls from his Hyperion days. There are more than enough people with glorious money to spare, ready to invest said money in his ever-growing franchise. _Perfect_.

'Hey, Rhys!'

The voice of a woman calls out to him and Rhys turns to the call only to be engulfed in strong arms, stumbling back yet regaining enough balance to remain on his feet and bear the weight of whoever had lunged at him. Sasha’s familiar dreads tuck themselves in under his chin before he gets a proper look at her face – he’d always thought the height difference was cute – and she laughs into his shoulder before drawing back to grin up at him, her expression warm like early sunlight and - is she wearing makeup? Maybe it was just the light but her skin seems to shimmer and for once it’s not because she’s covered in a layer of Pandoran grime and sweat. She's practically radiant.

'What are you doing here?' Rhys stammers, perplexed by her appearance and also frustrated by his own unnecessary objection to her being present in the first place. It was just Sasha; she’s his friend so it made sense for her to attend the gala to show her support. But a vocal part of his mind is telling him that she really needs to go, like right _now_.

Sasha laughs again at his exclamation, her voice sweet as honey, and her smile openly affectionate for him. 'We couldn’t miss your big fancy launch party, Mr. Big Fancy CEO! You invited us after all.'

'I invited—Wait, _us?_ '

Sasha nods and turns, gesturing almost theatrically with her arm to the others who follow after her. The crowds part first for Fiona, heading up the rest of the group with a grin she clearly tries to hold back on. She extends a friendly salute from her trademark white hat, and Rhys notes her clothes are cleaner than usual- much like Sasha’s. She is followed by Vaughn and Yvette, who chatter excitedly to each other as they gesture and laugh. They in turn are followed by a sullen-faced August, Athena and Janey hand-in-hand, Felix who appears somewhat absent or distracted, a widely grinning Scooter… even Vasquez, who adjusts his glaring yellow tie casually and glances around with a muted expression of admiration. Rhys can’t quite believe that the gang’s all here.

Something doesn’t sit right however. He knows that they _can’t_ all be here. Rhys notes there is something wrong with Vasquez’s face though he can’t quite put his finger on exactly _what_ is wrong with it- besides the insatiable urge inside him to punch it. Yet it proves to be disturbing enough that he can’t bear to look at him for more than a few seconds though that's nothing new.

And Scooter isn’t actually walking on the ground – he hovers a foot or so off the floor even when his legs swing in the movement of taking steps. And if he stays still for long enough, he starts to fade away entirely before he moves again and solidifies.

Felix is expressionless- a ghost in all but form, like he is not at all aware of where he is or who he is with; the monocle-like lens on his headgear is cracked, a piece missing to show nothing but a gaping black hole beneath the splintered glass where his eye ought to be visible. Rhys notices a few crumpled and bloodied dollar bills gripped determinedly in his white-knuckled fists.

Athena and Janey seem to flicker and teleport from place to place, and sometimes their wrists are roped together, even when they appear apart. Neither of them can look one another in the eyes it seems and Athena often ends up staring at the back of Janey’s head with a lovelorn expression.

The air takes on a strange digitized quality as Rhys feels his head swim, the world becoming blue-tinted and starting to crackle with static. Code floats around his head in patterns Rhys cannot decipher.

'What’s the matter, cupcake?' A silky smooth voice purrs in his ear as a hand grazes his neck almost tenderly with its knuckles. That’s a voice he hasn’t heard since—

And then it all floods back in a tidal wave of loss, anger, and revulsion.

Rhys is grabbed by the shoulders and wrenched around to face Vasquez, except his former rival _has_ no face; his head is skinless and bleeding profusely, crimson streams ruining his tailored suit and tie. His bloodstained teeth are bared and his lidless eyeballs bulge almost comically from his exposed skull. Crying out in shock, Rhys struggles against Vasquez’s rigor mortis grip, stumbling away from the reanimated corpse as one of its arms detaches from its shoulder and falls to the floor with a dull _thump_. Screams fill the jungle as the floating spore-like creatures of the biodome turn to a pulsating alarm red and descend upon the unsuspecting guests of the gala.

Disorientated and powerless to intervene, Rhys can only stare in disbelief as further disaster breaks out in quick succession around him – Yvette shoots Vaughn in the chest from point-blank range and runs from the mounting chaos with his seconds-fresh blood coating her arm. Scooter zooms straight up into the air like a rocket ship with a battle cry of his cartoonish catchphrase - “Catch a _riiiiiiiiiiiiiide!_ ” - before exploding into gaudy fireworks overhead. Fiona weeps inconsolably as she clutches a lifeless Sasha in her arms, both women drenched in the younger sister’s lifeblood and close to where Vaughn also lays dying. Felix has disappeared, leaving only a trail of his stained dollar bills behind on the ground near his adopted daughters and Athena and Janey fruitlessly attempt to fight off a horde of the hostile spores. August wrestles with the now-rotting zombie Vasquez, and the corpse is winning despite only having one arm at its disposal over August’s two.

And over it all, the delighted laughter of Rhys’ worst nightmare rings out across the carnage.

Terrified, Rhys lurches forward to Fiona and Sasha in a feeble effort to help them before a booted foot slams into his jaw and sends him sprawling backward again. The very same boot rests solidly on his chest, pushing down hard enough to make him gasp urgently for air. It is, of course, attached to Handsome Jack himself, _alive_ ; in the flesh and grinning like the devil he had always been. He sneers down at Rhys as the young man struggles under him like a pinned insect and he scoffs.

'You really thought I was _done_ with you?!' Jack accuses Rhys, his voice booming out over the pandemonium as if through loudspeakers, just as it had when he took over Helios when he and the others had infiltrated the moonbase, 'You thought you could just yank me out of your head and we’d be through? Oh Rhys, you stupid, stupid, _stupid_ little code monkey. I almost feel sorry for ya. Almost.'

'Make it _stop!_ ' Rhys begs, squirming to no avail under Jack’s hold. Somehow closing his eyes does nothing to block out all the death and grief around him; the gruesome drama continues to play out behind his eyelids, and over it all Jack’s echoing laugh and the cacophony of screams continue to reverberate down to his bones. He knows this is a dream. A nightmare. It has to be. He just has to wake up for it all to stop.

His tormentor laughs, because of course he knows what Rhys is thinking. 'Not that simple, Rhysie. It’s never gonna end and you know it because _I’m in your head_ , Rhys. I’m still here and I always will be, as long as you live and breathe. The only respite you’ll ever get from me is when you’re dead. And baby, oh, we are only just getting _started!’_

And with that, Jack releases Rhys for only a moment before he stomps on his head. The world fades to black with a sickening crunch and then a crushing wall of silence.


	2. Waiting

Fiona hears Rhys wake up with a startled gasp. She turns her head to see him behind her- he’s illuminated by the eerie purple and blue glow of the Vault crystals around them as he sits up and runs his fingers through his mussed hair, groaning softly.

‘Another dream?’ she asks.

‘A nightmare, same as before.’ Rhys confirms evasively, rubbing his face and massaging his forehead before rising from the ground to stretch and pop out the sleep lingering in his long limbs. He presses a finger to the port on the side of his head as if in contemplation of something but then elects to drop his hand and move towards Fiona instead.

‘Wanna talk about it yet?’ She offers, her concern for him uncharacteristic in its lack of restraint for once. This is the second time he had awoken from an already fitful bout of sleep in the short time they had been here.

Wherever the hell  _ here _ was. 

‘Not really.’ He replies, and although Fiona can guess that he doesn't quite mean it, that he probably would very much like to talk about it, she knows better than to press the issue. A part of Fiona almost doesn’t want to know, she can see how much it is clearly affecting Rhys and she could do with less bad news at this moment in time. She remains on the floor, cross-legged, diverting her attention once again to the huge glowing arch on the wall in front of her which she had been staring at since Rhys had taken the first turn to rest. The huge frame spans the tall space from the ceiling to the floor of the enclosed cavern they found themselves in after touching the chest; it is an inverted and rounded V shape, near enough identical to the familiar symbols present in myths surrounding the vaults and the elusive gates into those vaults. Both Fiona and Rhys had already thoroughly searched the perimeter for any way to leave the chamber without success and then Rhys had worn himself out panicking about their situation for a few minutes before he’d fallen asleep the first time. It would have almost been funny, Fiona imagines, had their situation felt less hopeless.

This strange archway on the wall feels like their only clue as to how they could leave- though so far it had offered no answers to confirm or deny that particular theory. Therefore, Rhys and Fiona had elected to take turns to keep watch over the glowing symbol… to wait to see what happens. It was surely a more productive idea than fruitlessly freaking out about it as Rhys had done before.

‘Anything new happen while I was out?’ Rhys asks, planting himself down beside Fiona and folding his lanky legs into much the same position as hers. They both focus on the mark, which thrums with faint pink light every once in awhile, like an alien heartbeat set into the stone wall itself. It is now apparent that Rhys had abandoned all hope of getting any decent rest, though Fiona had noted before when a mysterious stranger (or rather Loader Bot, as it turned out) had brought them back together that there were already dark bags accumulating under his eyes. It seemed like being the new Atlas CEO gave Rhys even more reason for sleepless nights. He’s not alone in this; Fiona is no stranger to her own nightmares after losing her father-figure, friends, and nearly her sister all in quick succession. She had been reliving their supposed failure for months now until the somewhat obligatory reunion that had resulted in the defeat of the Traveller.

‘Nope.’ She replied, pushing those thoughts aside to answer his question. ‘Apart from the thrumming and the humming, exactly jackshit has changed.’

_ Jack.  _ He's even a part of most of the colloquialisms she knows for crying out loud. Would the bastard ever really die?

Rhys sighs, resting his chin in his hands with his arms balanced on his knees. ‘Great. How long did I manage to sleep this time?’

‘Nearly three hours, I think.’ She says, and then offers a heartening addition, ‘Which is a little more than last time, right?’

Rhys huffs, appreciative of Fiona’s attempt at support through sarcasm but once more the two of them lapse into another unsure silence. Their thoughts were the same - had they somehow missed out on the true wealth of the Vault of the Traveller and unwittingly fallen into a trap, doomed to stare at a glowing Vault mark for all eternity? Would they ever see their friends and family again or would they die here, alone save for each other, after all they had accomplished and all the seemingly impossible obstacles they had overcome? 

Reaching into the folds of his once-black jacket that is now as marred by dust and scuffs from battle as the rest of him, Rhys brings out a silver chain necklace adorned with what appears to be a blue ECHO lens. The lens is cracked but safely encased in a plastic shell to preserve it. The blood once splattered across it has been wiped away but all it takes is a glance for Fiona to recognise what it is.

‘You kept it.’ she says in a hollow voice. Anyone who had not known of what was stored on that device would not understand why she leans away from Rhys and looks upon him in equal parts of shock and distrust.

Rhys nods, examining the relic with his new homemade yellow lens, his expression difficult to read- something between regret and contemplation. 

‘It’s a reminder. Of what I could become if I’m not careful.’ He explains, as if he weren’t someone who held what was arguably the most dangerous data storage device in the local universe in his hand, dangling innocently from a thin silver chain.

‘Keeping it… Rhys,  _ keeping  _ that damn thing is the least careful thing you could have done.’ She hisses, ‘You told us that you’d destroyed it, left it there in the wreckage when Helios came down.’

‘And what if I  _ had _ left it there for anyone to find? What if a part of it had still worked and someone thought to use it?’

Fiona is silenced by his words and the truth in them. At least the two of them knew what the ECHO lens held. Someone who didn’t- who had come across what seemed at first to just be especially valuable Hyperion tech; if they had found it- who knows what might have happened?

‘He’s… He’s still in there?’ She asks, her voice quieter this time, like she still can’t quite believe that their worst nightmare is right there in front of her in one piece, stored on a tiny fragile ECHO device, one that Rhys had torn from his own head in an effort to finally be rid of the one person they were still hesitant to name aloud.

‘As far as I know.’ Rhys confirms as the lens spins slowly suspended on the end of its chain and glistens in the low light of the Vault crystals that glow around them.


	3. Absence

Dusting her good hand on her trousers, her broken arm held close to her chest, Sasha smiles down appreciatively at the pile of loot by her feet, accumulated following the battle with the Traveller. Totally worth the almost-actual-suicide part of their suicide mission. They had racked up quite a few of those recently, when she takes the time to consider it. Turns out Felix was good for  _ something,  _ after all, even if Sasha herself had been reluctant to take the gift of the pocket watch in the first place. Another reason to be grateful for Fiona’s many ways of looking out for her but that’s what big sisters are for.

Sasha continues to admire her neat stack of loot with mounting optimism - a feeling stretched too far of late. Admittedly she doesn't have a clue as to what any of it actually does but it all looks very shiny and Vault-y and therefore has to be of value to someone out there- that's the most important part. Sasha allows herself to feel a little proud of her gathered treasure before she turns to call to her sister.

‘Hey Fi, what did you--’

A quick glance across the plateau offers no sign of her- or of their friend, Rhys for that matter. It's then that Sasha lifts her gaze to the Vault gate.

‘Sasha, you are  _ not  _ gonna believe what we-- Sasha?’

Coming around one of the heaps of the petrified remains of the Traveller, Vaughn finds the young woman cradling her injured arm to her torso, staring out over the plateau. She is silent and does not immediately turn at the calling of her name. The now forgotten pile of Vault loot lays at her feet; she seems to have neglected it in a moment of shock or surprise.

Vaughn follows her stare and realizes what has her so transfixed and his heart suddenly feels as if it were made of lead as it sinks through his torso; the entrance to the Vault which had once towered over them has disappeared into thin air like it had never been there at all. 

And so have Rhys and Fiona along with it.

‘What happened?’ he asks, knowing already that there is likely no answer that he wants to hear, vainly hoping against hope that there might be some more of those impossible odds in their favor. He approaches Sasha cautiously as if any misplaced step might cause the earth to crumble and swallow them both up into it. The panic settling into his body almost wishes that it would, in the far-fetched desperate train of thought that it might take them to Rhys and Fiona somehow. He would be the first to admit that far weirder things had happened to them all, leading up to this moment. Irrationality isn’t so irrational on Pandora, it seems. And he’d always thought Helios had been more than enough of a shitstorm to live in.

Sasha shakes her head though she is still otherwise motionless, focused on the spot where the gate to the Vault had stood before them only moments before. ‘I don't know. They both took off running for the gate and then I called out, telling them to wait for us. But they had to have the glory-- the last word. I looked away just for a minute. They must have gone through, and then seconds later it… It was gone.  _ They _ were gone.’

A distant howl echoes across the wastelands as the two friends continue to look upon the emptiness before them without speaking another word; the sorrowful wails of a nearby skag pack fill their ears and their hearts with dread.


	4. Fortune Favored

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> First of two arts from Sanzo here!

Sitting around and waiting to see what would happen was proving to be a hell of a lot harder and more tiring than Rhys and Fiona could have ever anticipated, despite the intensity of their recent battle with the Vault monster  and all the many near-death experiences of the last few hours. A rest ought to have been welcome; all this sitting and waiting should have felt like an easy task in comparison but it was fast becoming quite the opposite. The pulsing light of the archway makes them both drowsy when neither of them are keen to fall asleep -- Rhys because of the constant recurring nightmares and Fiona because this entire predicament has her skin crawling. Their mounting hopelessness sets her teeth on edge, resembling the distinct feeling of chewing on a mouthful of grit; a sensation she has become more and more accustomed to over the duration of their journey to find the Vault. That does not mean it is a feeling she can tolerate however. Her blue fingernails, the once vibrant paint on them now chipped and neglected, leave indents in her coat sleeves where she has been clutching her own arms so tightly under stress.

She considers asking Rhys to stop pacing again but she’s already done that twice in a short span of time and he’s always resumed after a brief break of hovering in one spot, muttering and fiddling with his prosthetic arm. The steady rhythm of his footsteps paired with the thrumming light of the Vault mark on the wall causes Fiona to become even more sluggish as time goes on. She tries to shake off the looming threat of sleep before standing up to give her numb haunches a rest. The gentle pins and needles starting to prick in the muscles of her lower back and waist finally drive off the heaviness of her limbs and the disquiet in her mind - even if it is just for a few moments. Momentary relief is still something to be grateful for, after all.

Neither of them speak as Fiona continues to stretch and Rhys paces, the semi-silence proves to be oppressive, gnawing at both of them relentlessly the longer it is left undisturbed.

Too oppressive, it seems.

With a shout of pent-up frustration that rings and ricochets through the otherwise empty grotto, Rhys kicks a loose stone on the ground near his foot, sending it sailing through the air past Fiona and towards the glowing archway before them. Fiona dodges to the side just in time as the stone whistles past her head and she brings her arms to shield her face in anticipation of the rock bouncing off the wall back at her. She braces for the pain that will come with such an impact, as well as for the inevitable shouting match that will follow with Rhys for his impulsive idiocy.

But the impact never comes. There is no sound of the stone skittering back at them as they might have expected. As Fiona and Rhys lift their gaze to the rock face they stare dumbstruck by it; ripples spread across it like a pebble has been dropped into a body of water, disappearing somewhere else beneath the opaque surface.

‘Oh.’ Rhys manages, his voice barely above a shocked whisper as he slowly moves to Fiona’s side. They gradually turn from staring at the archway to each other and then back to the quivering wall before he continues. ‘That’s… not what I thought would happen.’

‘So we could have walked through it this entire time, instead of just sitting here?’ Fiona suggests.

‘I mean, yeah, we _could_ have, but…’

‘What do you think is on the other side?’ Fiona asks, knowing Rhys’ own hesitance in that exact question though her mind stalls on any concrete answers to her inquiry. After everything they had been through, the consequences of passing through the strange doorway were seemingly infinite. But it could be a way out, even a way home, or the gateway to their sought-after horde of legendary Vault treasure. And all of those possibilities lay only a few feet away- just three or four steps ahead of them.

‘Maybe we ought to… find out?’ Rhys suggests and although his voice betrays his obvious fear there is also a hint of curiosity that Fiona can't deny is invading her own thoughts. They are Vault Hunters now and this is no time to play it safe - they could be so close to the treasure of the Vault that they had sacrificed so much for. With her determination ignited by the promise of more adventure and by the endless opportunity presented with the new path presenting itself, Fiona takes a step toward the archway with a less emboldened Rhys close beside her.

The strange wavelets in the rockface pass back and forth until they eventually slow and stop, returning to looking very much like a solid wall again but appearances certainly are deceiving. Fiona extends her hand and gently touches near where she estimates the stone passed through before yanking her fingers away just in case - again the rock face shudders- this time at her wary touch, and the solid surface is liquefied and animated once more.

‘Well, that’s weird.’ Rhys deadpans as he reaches out with his prosthetic arm to do the same as Fiona. More ripples break out, crashing with her own and causing the entire rock face within the arch to pulse and shudder.

They meet each other’s eyes and quietly laugh together at the weirdness of it all, both made giddy in an ongoing state of disbelief, and then seem to hesitate on the question of whether or not they should go for it after all. Rhys keeps his hand resting against the questionable stone and feels no resistance as one would expect to with a normal solid surface as he runs his palm across it, the ripples bouncing and deflecting off one another. Fiona’s gaze runs up and down the mark, weighing their options.

‘There could be anything on the other side.’ Rhys says, breaking the pressure of the mounting silence before it becomes overwhelming again.

‘There could be a way out of here- back to Sasha and the others.’ Fiona hopes aloud.

‘Or a portal to a hell-planet. Like, a worse-than-Pandora, covered-in-lava hell-planet, or someplace _even more_ awful.’ Rhys counters, pausing on a thought before sharing it with Fiona, ‘This _is_ the Vault of the Traveller, right? Maybe it’s supposed to be… some kind of crossroads?’

‘That is… a strangely intelligent observation for you, Rhys.’ Fiona replies.

‘I’m gonna go right ahead and take that as a compliment, so thank you.’ He says and tries a smile, ‘How about ladies first?’

Fiona nods calmly. ‘Sure. Go right ahead.’

With his prosthetic hand still pressed ever so slightly into the wall and his focus still directed entirely upon Fiona- and hers in turn upon him as she smirks at his offense of the teasing comment- Rhys fails to notice the thin white fingers wrapping around his metal wrist until it is far too late. All he can do as he is dragged through the fluid wall is let out a shocked cry which is cut off sharply as he disappears into the rock, leaving behind no trace of him except the black leather boot from his right foot.

Fiona is left blinking at the space beside her that Rhys had occupied mere seconds before and at the lone shoe that had slipped from his foot. She lingers only a moment longer before she springs into action, passing into the wall herself and wishing she was more confident that she would find Rhys unscathed on the other side and not a worse-that-Pandora, covered-in-lava hell-planet.

The only evidence that they were ever in the grotto at all as the rock face stills to a solid state and the archway fades completely is the lonely boot abandoned on the stone floor.


	5. Encounter

Rhys is immediately released by his mysterious captor as he passes through the concealed portal. He crashes to the floor but manages to catch himself just in time despite his disorientation, keeping his head from colliding with the ground. Instead he lands hard on the shoulder still composed of flesh and bone. Rhys grunts and rolls on his back limply, his bones aching, the abused joint where his arm meets his collarbone stabbing with pain as he stares up at the pair of white, insect-like figures who seem to be looking back at him. One of the figures makes a soft clicking sound to the other, speaking in a language Rhys could never hope to understand. It raises a long stick similar in appearance to a spear and the stick crackles with a ball of purple energy not unlike Rhys’ own stun baton as the end is pointed at his face. In a less intense situation, one where he might have been understood and was not under immediate threat of attack, he would have been tempted to make a joke about envy, seeing as despite the similarities the spear  _ is _ a little longer than his. It was the sort of joke that might have meant something back in his Hyperion days, back when facing death on a daily basis seemed like some adventurous daydream.

‘Uhh, hi there.’ Rhys manages to choke out. Recalling that Fiona had mentioned some kind of resistance while she and Sasha were inside the Traveller, he wonders if these creatures are the same kind - the Guardians, that the two women faced. It is no secret to anyone who knows anything about the Vaults that ancient beings reside within them, installed by a mysterious extinct race known only as the Eridians. But these creatures had attacked Fiona and Sasha on sight without any delay inside the Traveller, which raises the question - why the pause now when they have him helpless on the ground, unable to defend himself against them?

_ Maybe they pity you,  _ Rhys ponders to himself with a voice that sounds irritatingly like Handsome Jack’s. As grateful as he is to still be breathing he almost wishes he’d been given the chance to put up a fight. However, Rhys would be the first to admit that his few months of life on Pandora so far had not given him a great arsenal of combat skills to work with, not when compared to Fiona, Sasha, August, Athena, and all the others he had met who had so far scraped a living in the wastelands of the planet. Even Vaughn would likely be more capable than Rhys in a fight with his quick reflexes and maintained abs.

Disturbing the sudden, distracting thoughts of Vaughn’s abs, the second creature clicks in response to the first, tipping its head as they both examine Rhys with their strange glowing eyes, the color of which changes from orange to purple to blue to white in a slow ebbing pattern much like the archway from the grotto. The crackling spear is still directed at his face and Rhys can feel the warmth from it starting to burn the skin on the tip of his nose. Above the strange beings, he sees another rock ceiling with vibrant crystals dotted across it, also very similar like the previous chamber he had been in with Fiona; he assumes he must have remained inside the Vault when passing through the gateway or has at least been transported somewhere similar.

As if they realize he is not an immediate threat - which relieves Rhys but also offends him slightly, the armed creature retracts its spear and the two creatures step away from him. Rhys eases himself up into a sitting position and continues to stare at the alien forms while they in turn watch him with interest, seemingly just as fascinated by him as he is by them, though not nearly as wary. It occurs to Rhys that if they are the Vault’s Guardians, and no one else has entered the Vault of the Traveller before him and Fiona, then he might be the first human these individuals have ever seen. Or even their first alien life form entirely. If he were not so on edge he would feel slightly proud of that fact.

Without any further interaction among themselves the two Guardians turn and move away from Rhys. They walk in synchronized, almost soldier-like steps further into the space which Rhys can now see leads into a darkened tunnel up ahead. The only source of light from inside the tunnel is the faint glow of luminescent Vault crystals. The Guardians stop at the entrance and turn to face Rhys again expectantly. The one holding the energy spear gestures noiselessly into the gaping hole in the rock and the pair remain standing on the same spot apparently waiting for Rhys to follow them in.

Aware that his right foot is distinctly colder than his left, Rhys notes that he appears to have left a boot behind with Fiona. The bright yellow of his striped sock almost glares at him in the dim light of the cavern. ‘Not again.’ he mutters as he clambers to his feet and dusts himself off. At least they hadn’t been fleeing rakk hives and moon shots this time. The lack of immediate threat of death in this situation gave him more room to stew on the loss of his boot this time around.

His hand hovers over the stun baton which is thankfully, still strapped to his hip and he thinks of drawing it just in case. His palm slips over the handle and the business end crackles a faint blue, the energised tip warm against his leg. The Guardians hiss and take up aggressive stances as it does so, assuming correctly that it is a weapon - the one armed with the spear raises it again, the active end fizzling with hot pink sparks. The second opens its palms and contains its own aura of vibrant orange in its clawed hands.

Rhys raises his own hands in what he hopes is a  _ universal _ sign of surrender, backing away a few steps, limping slightly where his unprotected foot leaves him a little imbalanced. ‘Whoa whoa whoa! No harm done, right?’ He offers, his voice shaky from being startled by their reactions, ‘Just being cautious, okay? I-I didn’t mean to start anything or frighten you guys or…’

The Guardians remain poised for attack a moment longer, their scrutiny weighing on Rhys heavily. He is briefly reminded of the feeling of Jack’s weight on his chest from his recurring nightmare- a suffocating sensation created by his own mind though it feels painfully real even at this moment, his breath drawn into his lungs in short, rapid gasps. But then the Guardians drop their stances, communicating in a series of sounds that remain unclear in meaning to Rhys. He can make out that they sound vaguely irritated - not an unusual reaction to Rhys’ often foolhardy actions, his friends would likely have argued if they were here.

On that thought Rhys glances about him once he has lowered his arms and confirms that he is- in fact, alone apart from the Guardians. A sharp pang of guilt and worry stabs his chest and he almost thinks the Guardian’s spear might have hurt him less. Had Fiona leapt through after him in an effort to save him or had she remained, finding herself in some form of trouble of her own? Rhys knows he could never be certain without going back through the portal, but doing so alone is too high a risk. One step - though not one taken willingly - had brought him here. Where might he end up if he passed through the archway again? He turns and examines the rock wall behind him nonetheless before another spike of panic jolts through his torso as he sees the portal is no longer there, the space it occupied no more than bare, solid rock. If Fiona had followed him through it had not brought her here with him.

So where was she? 

By this point the Guardians have already turned away and are marching once again in unison into the tunnel ahead of him. Rhys turns back to them and follows, anxiously fiddling with his jacket and not at all knowing what he might face ahead but what other choice did he have? He lets his limbs hanging limply by his sides in what he hopes appears as a show of passiveness and non-aggression. The only feasible way was forward, at least for now.


	6. Isolation

Fiona leaps through the wall with her deringer raised and her heart pounding to find no ground beneath her feet to catch her. She is falling. Cold air bites her skin as it whips through her hair and clothes and she is unable to scream - unable even to  _ breathe _ \- as she plummets through darkness, her arms and legs flailing in terror as she tries and fails to somehow right herself in her free fall. Tiny trails of white light flash past as she spins over and over herself, her speed of descent destroys all hope of determining which way is up. She could have been plummeting for mere seconds, maybe for longer and she would not know for certain.

A blur of a shape darker still than the emptiness around her begins to grow and hurtle towards her as she spirals downwards and Fiona’s life – or at least moments and sensations of it – flash before her eyes. She didn’t realize this would happen and assumed it had been some sort of overused cliché up until now. Fiona’s panic is overwhelmed by visions of her past She remembers huddling with Sasha in the cold, Felix’s gentle hands guiding her into a new home, warm and dry. The taste of blood in her first fistfight, smoke hanging thickly in the air of Hollow Point; the deal for the Vault key going wrong, hurtling through space to Helios and back again as the base burned around her, finding what she and Rhys thought had been treasure in the Vault that was close enough to reach out and touch—

Then without warning, Fiona is engulfed in a crushing icy cold- a new unforgiving darkness that envelops her. She inhales unwillingly from the shock and takes in desperate mouthfuls of liquid. Fiona kicks hopelessly, already choking on the deadly contents of her lungs. Her whole body feels as if it were made of stone or that weights were tied to her ankles to drag her down into the nothingness as the liquid soaking into her clothes. Pandora never offered much reason to learn to swim but she keeps trying in vain, praying to any god that happened to be listening for her to break the surface and find air again.

Against all the odds she does. Splashing and coughing into the sweet embrace of breathable air. Fiona hacks and splutters, thrashing about in the mystery fluid she’d landed in. No taste fills her mouth and she hopes she is correct in guessing that it’s just water. Her white hat floats nearby – she can just about see it, her eyes now starting to adjust in the once seemingly lightless place she finds herself in. Lifting her head as she paddles to keep her mouth out of the water, Fiona sees the white orbs that her mind had registered while she was falling; two bright moons and hundreds upon thousands of stars shine in a clear cloudless sky overhead. If her heart hadn’t been thundering in her chest from yet another brush with death, Fiona might have actually appreciated the view. As it was, she retrieves her hat and then uses her now adjusted vision to find a nearby shore to swim to.

Fiona slumps heavily down on dry land once she has crawled from the icy cold lake. She lays on her side and coughs up what she hopes is the last of the liquid in her lungs before falling onto her back, staring up at the inky blue sky above and gasping until her breathing slows. Adrenaline still forces her heart against her ribcage in painful thudding beats but this serves as a forceful reminder that she is  _ alive _ . However, she is also alone and this thought quickly takes over her mind, eating away any relief she had from her survival.

Where had Rhys ended up? There had been no sign of something pulling him; for a moment it seemed as if he had just leaned too far on the wall and disappeared into the portal hidden beneath but his whole body had passed through as if he had been yanked in by some unseen force. So who - or what - had dragged him in? And would he survive the encounter, alone and armed only with his stun baton and quick thinking?

Fiona fears that she already knows the answer and no amount of stubborn determination can force the image of a bloodied and beaten Rhys - laying on the ground, unmoving and lifeless - from her mind. A heavy guilt settles in her chest much like the sensation of someone standing atop her ribs. Perhaps it’s just the lingering fluid in her system but  _ that _ is not a calming thought to her, either. She couldn’t help Rhys or even begin to try and find him if she drowned in her own lungs.

And what of Sasha? Had her sister and the others noticed that they were missing from the Traveller’s final resting place? If they had how could they hope to even begin looking for them when she and Rhys themselves had no idea where they were in the first place? Fiona pictured her younger sister standing with Vaughn, wondering where she and Rhys had gone and why they had left without them.  _ Maybe she would feel slighted about you and Rhys taking the treasure of the Vault for yourselves _ , Fiona ponders. Such thoughts are worthless; Sasha knows better than that. Besides, that had not been their intention.

Well, maybe it had been- a little. They had hoped to hog a bit of the glory of the Vault of the Traveller and prove themselves to be real Vault Hunters.  _ Like a family _ , they had insisted as they ran together to the Vault’s entrance. And look where it had gotten them in the end.

Fiona realizes after a moment that she tastes salt, that she is crying in both frustration and the fear of being alone. Choking now on air rather than the water that had nearly killed her, she remains on the shore and cries, her breaths taking form as deep, shuddering sobs, allowing her feelings and her exhaustion to consume her as the cold water laps at her feet.


	7. Meanwhile

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Second art from Sanzo in this chapter!

‘And you really think it’ll work?’ Sasha asks, hovering over Vaughn as he taps and swipes at one of the few working monitors within the remains of the crashed Hyperion moonbase. Two of the Children of Helios (as the survivors have been named) stand guard at the door with guns for no discernable reason other than for the fact that they can. Sasha knows a lot of them had probably never actually fired a real gun before having to survive on the hellscape that is Pandora and she almost feels sorry for them.

Almost.

But they were still Hyperion not so long ago and such a feeling of pity quickly fades from her mind. Still, she supposes that Rhys and Vaughn had proven to be at least tolerable over their wild misadventures in pursuit of the Vault. She had learned to forgive them for working for the bad guys. Maybe in time she could afford to give the Children the benefit of the doubt too.

‘I _think_ it’ll work.’ Vaughn agrees, followed by him clicking his tongue in frustration as he attempts to find the necessary ECHOnet application, ‘Whether it actually _will_ is another point entirely.’

He stops for a moment and runs a hand through his hair, having let down the bun he usually tied it in. ‘Rhys would know how to do this way better than I do. I should’ve paid more attention when he showed me before, then we--’

‘ **HEY THERE, USELESS LACKEYS OF HYPERION! THIS IS YOUR BOSS, BACK FROM THE DEAD, HANDSOME JACK HIMSELF, REMINDING ALL EMPLOYEES TO--** ’ The whole ruin shakes with the broadcast of _that_ unmistakeable voice blaring throughout, followed by harsh barking static and various echoing screams across Helios. More words blurt through the crackling and popping, most of them unintelligible, before Vaughn manages to shut it off entirely.

‘ **STRANGLE-- AIRLOCK-- BITCH-- FIND YOU--** ’

‘What the _hell_ was _that?!’_ Sasha hisses, rubbing an ear with the hand of her good arm emphatically as she scowls at Vaughn. Panicked shouting can be heard in the hallways around them; clearly quite a few ex-employees had accepted that they would never have to listen to their late tyrannical CEO’s voice ever again. Such was the shock of being exposed to it after his second death that it had triggered an extreme reaction of fear and relapse for many. Those who might have once worshipped the ground that man had spat upon now likely cursed the day they ever signed their lives over to his infamous company just to make guns and robots and countless other instruments of destruction - much to Jack’s delight.

‘You remember that time when you three crashed an entire moon base after Rhys uploaded an A.I. of a madman into its system from his head, while I was kept prisoner by a crazy bandit queen?’ Vaughn quips back, ‘Yeah, well, there just might still be remnants of that A.I.’s code in the network where it assimilated itself entirely before trying to use Rhys as a freaking meat puppet.’

‘Oh, you think?’ Sasha groans.

‘Well, you _did_ ask.’ Vaughn points out, his equal sarcasm quickly cut off with a relenting sigh; arguing would get them nowhere closer to finding Rhys and Fiona. ‘These are just announcements from when Jack was trying to track you guys down, I think. We’re not actually at risk in any way. At least, as far as I can tell. Not that there’s much of the base left for him to use, only the refurbished turrets and the cameras, and maybe the moon shot cannon if--’

‘Reassuring. Thank you, Vaughn. I’m so glad a computer program made by an insane scientist based on the literal dictionary definition of an egotistical maniac is not going to try and brutally murder us _yet_ _again_.’

‘I’m doing my best, okay?’ He blurts, slamming his hands down on the console. Sasha sees how his shoulders tremor as he draws in a steadying breath and she feels ashamed for snapping at him when they were both terrified about where the others were. ‘I just--’

Sasha reaches out and places a hand on Vaughn’s back, before stepping closer and wrapping her arm around him from behind- though she is careful not to crush her broken limb between them both. They allow the moment to stretch on, softly shaking with their own barely contained fear for the other half of their little ragtag family.

‘Let’s see if we can get that message sent after all, huh?’ Sasha suggests after a while and she draws back when she feels rather than sees Vaughn nod in response. They compose themselves and Vaughn goes back to his work at the monitor typing and clicking through the available functions as Sasha now stands beside him, resisting the urge to hop from one foot to the other to vent her agitation. ‘Besides, how hard can it be between the both of us?’

‘If we’re lucky, Helios didn’t hit all of the old Hyperion satellites on the way down. That means we can broadcast a message to Rhys, wherever he actually is, as long as that wherever is somewhere within the nearest six galaxies.’

‘A Vault couldn’t have taken them further than that, could it? Or even further than just Pandora?’ Sasha asks, a little shocked that there was even a chance of such a feat being possible. Vaughn’s silence does nothing to reassure her. There is so much about the Vaults they still didn’t know or understand and Sasha doubts that even the few ‘experts’ on the subject would be able to help them in this particular circumstance. To think stepping - or rather sprinting - through the archway into the Vault of the Traveller could have taken them off the planet entirely was much more than sobering. It was terrifying.

Lost in her thoughts while Vaughn works, Sasha rubs her fingers against the lukewarm metal casing of Felix’s watch which sits in her pocket - the same watch that had saved her life just a short while ago. _Time heals all wounds,_ the message from Felix said. Sasha recalls how she had wanted to leave it behind with the rest of their belongings in Hollow Point, what felt like an age ago now, and how Fiona had insisted on bringing it along. She was eventually right - of course she was - about it being important; if it had been left in Felix’s hovel then Sasha would have died today, bleeding out on the plateau amid the smouldering remains of the Traveller. Although she could get herself out of a sticky situation or five when the situation demanded it, Fiona has always been the more capable problem solver out of the two. Sasha is well aware that her older sibling has helped her out of a lot of dilemmas that she could not have dealt with alone and instantly she is able to recall numerous such occasions from years before the Vault key plot was even an inkling of an idea in Felix’s mind. Sasha knows she has her sister to thank for her life countless times over; the least she could do was be patient while Vaughn tried to find some way to contact her and Rhys.

 _Rhys_. The Hyperion company man was hopeless, hesitant, and yet charming and likeable in his own impossible way. He had often proved himself to be much the opposite of what Sasha and probably most other Pandorans would expect from an employee of one of the most notorious companies known to man. Though he himself probably didn’t realize it, he could be a good leader when the situation arose for him to be step up and be one; his rebuilding of Atlas stood as a testament to the fact. And he was a little cute with his shy smiles and neck rubbing awkwardness- though Sasha would not openly admit it. Light flirting is about as far as she would comfortably go. For now, at least.

Vaughn’s mind is also focused on their lost companions - though not quite in the same vein Sasha’s has reached. He thinks of how Rhys has been there for him time and time over, how he had never abandoned him even when it would have been easier to just leave him behind to leering bouncers or bandits, from when they first met in college right through to being stranded here on Pandora. He might never have survived on Helios or on this psycho-ridden death planet as long as he had were it not for Rhys at his side. They were the ultimate bros and would remain so until the bitter end. If he could do anything to be reunited with him, he would do it- even after they had sacrificed so much to get here.

And then there was Fiona; the endlessly confident, infinitely capable, and undeniably beautiful Fiona. Vaughn had never met a woman like her. Girls on Helios tended to be fickle and fragile sometimes but Sasha and her sister are both forces to be reckoned with all on their own. Vaughn had developed immeasurable respect and admiration for both women but for Fiona in particular, after their early stint in Bossanova’s death race where they had been forced to work together to recover the case of cash - and survive. They had made a pretty good team despite only knowing each other for a few hours at that point.

‘Oh fuck.’ Vaughn mutters, interrupting both their thoughts of their companions. He moves away from the monitor and continues to curse under his breath as something starts pinging faintly on the console, ‘Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck _fuck._ ’

‘What? What’s wrong?’ Sasha says, knowing she won’t likely understand what is on the screen and instead pursuing Vaughn for an explanation as he stalks around the room.

‘We’re not gonna be able to contact Rhys using this. He doesn’t have Hyperion tech in him anymore, right?’ Vaughn replies, ‘He replaced his arm and eye after the Jack thing and the crash, so even though his internal head stuff might be the original, we can’t use it to track him down.’

‘Why not? Can’t you just--’

‘I don’t know! But we can’t do it the way Rhys showed me to do it and I don’t _really_ know what I’m _doing_ in the first place! So I don’t know what to do and this is the only plan we’ve got and I can’t--’

‘Maybe I can help!’ a high-pitched voice interrupts, young and feminine-sounding, inflected by a digital edge that identifies it as a voice not belong to a human.

Sasha and Vaughn turn abruptly to the source of the intrusion. Gortys has rolled into the room, closely followed by her guardian Loader Bot. She smiles and blinks up at the two silenced humans before Sasha smiles in return and kneels down next to the spherical robot like one would to be on the same level as a child. Strange to think that only a short while before something so cute and innocent was a towering machine of battle facing off against a creature of Pandoran legend and for the second time at that. The first time Sasha and Fiona had brought her down with a missile launcher but friends don’t hold grudges. Both Gortys - and Loader Bot - had forgiven them for that particular stunt, what with it being the idea of Gortys anyway, and having saved them from the Traveller until they could rally their allies and take a second shot at facing it.

‘What do you have in mind?’ Sasha asks, her hope reignited just a little.

Gortys wheels herself over to the monitor Vaughn abandoned which still pings with some kind of alert. ‘I connected with Rhys in the fight with the Traveller, just the same as I connected with the others.’ she explains as Loader Bot, Sasha, and Vaughn follow her to the blinking screen, ‘So I can find him. I think. In fact, with the data imprinted in my memory, I oughta be able to find any of you now, wherever you might be! My logged data goes into the system and with a bit of jimmying and finger crossing, I can get a location- or something pretty close to it.’

‘So you could track down Rhys _and_ Fiona, if they got separated?’ Vaughn chips in.

‘Yes! Well… In theory.’ Gortys confirms before she frowns up at him, ‘Have they been separated?’

Vaughn rubs the back of his neck. ‘Well, we don’t know. Consider it a worst case scenario, I guess?’

That worst case scenario being better than the as of yet unspoken Worst Case Scenario; that Rhys and Fiona don’t come back at all because there’s nothing left of them to find.

‘You’re gonna have to be patient with me. I haven’t done this before or anything like it. Plus it’s Hyperion tech, so I’m not exactly… compatible. You know Atlas and Hyperion didn’t always get on. True, they stole each other’s ideas from time to time- or rather _all_ the time, but--’

‘It’s okay, Gortys. No pressure. You’ve got this.’ Sasha assures the little robot with a thumbs up of support, and Gortys smiles brightly from her support.

‘I do not like this plan.’ Loader Bot announces, ‘He remains in the system. We heard Him. That is why we came. Gortys could get hurt. Or worse.’

Sasha and Vaughn exchange glances. Loader Bot had a more than substantial point. The Handsome Jack AI had manipulated their whole Vault plan in his favor just to get back to Helios and take over Hyperion again with the intention of hijacking Rhys as a flesh vessel with the very same frame that Loader Bot now inhabited out of necessity. It could try and do the same through Gortys and again, the powered up form of the currently adorable Atlas construct is fresh in their minds. The last thing they wanted was Jack coming back to haunt them like _that_. The echoes that sparked out of the console had been enough to terrify them and most of the Children of Helios. A literal colossal death machine that could take down a Vault Monster, let alone crush them one by one under its heel like roaches? No thanks.

Loader Bot shifts their gaze to Gortys at their side, their garish yellow hand resting tenderly on her smooth silver domed head. ‘There is no Dana. Only Zuul.’

‘I’d really like to give it a try. It’s gotta be worth a shot, right?’ Gortys insists, gazing up at the three of them with her big hopeful blue eyes. Although the plan now feels a lot less like a good one and more like a really really bad one, they know they have few other choices to go with. Few being none.

Their hesitant consent left unspoken, Gortys reaches out and places her finger into a universal port beneath the glowing screen. Sasha and Vaughn hold their breath and Loader Bot would likely do the same if breathing proved necessary for them. The weighted silence goes on for what seems like a small eternity, and then...

‘Holy shit.’ Vaughn murmurs in disbelief, staring at the miracle of a pop-up message which has appeared on the console’s screen.

‘What is it?’ Sasha perks up, her attention still on Gortys. She leans forward to read the notification on the monitor.

_ECHOlink successfully established. Contacting RHYS._

‘Holy shit.’ She repeats, and she and Vaughn turn to each other and grin widely. Another one in a million shot in their favor; they’d managed to track him down. Loader Bot offers a high five to Vaughn- who readily accepts with a triumphant whoop and Gortys hums a quiet, happy melody of electronic notes. They may not have concrete cause for celebration yet. But it’s a start.


	8. Contact

“ _ Rhys! Rhys, can you--” _

The Guardians pause and wait as Rhys stops abruptly in his tracks, the crackling static sound in his head bringing him to a sudden halt. He hisses and rubs his temple, the static crackling in his mind akin to the stabbing pain of a hangover. But it hadn’t just been white noise - there was a voice somewhere in that barrage of sound, a woman’s voice saying his name. Fiona, maybe? Whoever it was- and however poor the signal probably is from his being in the tunnel, they are trying to contact him.

Rhys holds up a hand to the Guardians, attempting to offer any kind of reassurance through the harsh data influx in his mind. ‘One minute, okay? Just give me one minute. Wait there. Wait? Just… Just wait. Stay.’ He insists, wishing he sounded less patronizing; he felt like he was instructing a dog.

Without any indication of doing so the Guardians nonetheless seem to understand. The staff-wielding one rests its weapon down on the ground in the way someone might use a walking cane, leaning upon it, and the other continues forward a short distance more seemingly scouting around the tunnel ahead for something.

Rhys does his best to tune into the sketchy signal and loads up the screen prompt from his ECHOlink to his arm prosthetic. The holographic image display is grainy and it flickers wildly, interspersed with what he is pretty sure are old Hyperion ads from before even his time with the company, but he knows the expectant faces that squint for any sign of response on-screen and the tall yellow frame beside them.

‘Vaughn! Sasha! Loader Bot!’ Rhys exclaims, a relieved grin spreading on his face as a decent portion of the tension in his body and mind lifts. ‘Oh my god, am I glad to hear from you guys. Are you okay?’

‘Okay? We’re fine, Rhys.’ Vaughn replies, ‘Don’t worry about us - but what about you? Where the hell even  _ are _ you, man?’

‘Hello, Rhys!’ Gortys calls and one of her silver hands extends to give him a keen little wave though she is not tall enough to peer up at the screen, ‘The plan worked! Gosh, I’m super glad about that. Definitely worth the big scary risk.’

‘Risk? How did you even find me? Can you--’

‘Is Fiona there? Is she alright?’ Sasha interjects, hovering closer to the camera as if to try and see her.

Rhys bites his bottom lip and does not answer immediately. The brief silence before he speaks is enough confirmation of their worry - something has happened. ‘We got separated. There wasn’t any treasure in the Vault after all, just a chest which activated a portal that led us… somewhere. I… I’m sorry, Sasha. I don’t know where she is.’


	9. Revelations

‘Come on, cut it out.’ Fiona chastises herself, rubbing angrily at her eyes with her jacket cuffs before sitting up and adjusting her hat atop her head. She sniffs and coughs, trying to shake off the outpouring of emotion which had virtually crippled her moments ago. ‘This is  _ not _ gonna get you home.’

She stands and pats herself down, removing her jacket to wring it out; sadly there was not much to be done about the rest of her outfit, so she gives up attempting to dry herself off and turns to gain a grasp on her surroundings. There is the tall silhouette of a craggy mountain range behind her, jutting sharply into the dark night sky above which is broken by the distant glow of stars and two moons. Then ahead, on the other side of the pool (or rather what looked like a lake) which she had fallen into, is the looming shadow of a distinctly human-built block. It appears to be too square and deliberate to be naturally occurring in Fiona’s mind and from her current location she can see dim flickering red lights and the vague shapes of what seemed to be machines around it.

It would provide shelter at least should the weather take a turn for the worse. And if there are still people there, they might be able to help her. If not, she has her pistol and she’s a Vault Hunter, right? The words - even when repeated aloud - do not reassure her in the slightest but she settles on heading towards the isolated building anyway. It was a plan- at least for now.

As she nears the squat structure a few signs loom into view, barely decipherable in the pale moonlight until she stands close enough to read them. One says  _ Mining Site In Operation _ , and another says  _ Trespassers Will Be Shot on Sight! _ . There are others that read  _ Danger! Really Big Sinkholes Ahead _ and similar messages and strangely a few old Atlas advertisements. Fiona even finds one for Pandora which promises bold adventures on a new Old West frontier and cannot help but chuckle to herself.

‘So much for humanity’s boundless optimism.’

It then occurs to her that the presence of posters advertising going to Pandora means she probably isn’t actually  _ on  _ Pandora anymore. The realisation stops her in her tracks as she blinks unseeing at the cheerful backpacking couple admiring an artistic impression of her home planet’s untouched landscape. Her eyes drift up to the two moons dominating the sky above her, great grey orbs staring her in the face that should have been indication enough that she was a long way from home. Maybe she had hit the water too hard to notice. 

A phrase Felix used to say to her and Sasha when they were kids pops unbidden into her head -  _ We’re not in Kansas anymore,  _ he had said in any situation where he felt they were out of their depth. Fiona never used to understand what those words had meant but now realisation rings clear through the isolation threatening to seize her again. Kansas was unknown; a place she had never seen or heard of, but it sounded like home. And home felt like it was a very, very long way away.

Running her fingertip along the muzzle of the pistol at her wrist, Fiona marches toward the nearby building with a new steely determination. She will find help. She will find Rhys. She  _ will _ get home. 

A large sign, lit by the stolen glow of the twin moons in the sky, declares her location as she draws near.

**ATLAS welcomes you to PROMETHEA**


	10. Offering

‘You don’t know where she is?’ Sasha repeats, in a voice so thick with venom that Rhys is sure he sees the Guardians flinch at the same time as he does. ‘What do you mean you don’t know where she is?!’

‘We got separated, okay? We didn’t split up on purpose. Nobody does that.’ He insists, reminded for a moment of old horror movies he’d watched with Vaughn and Yvette, where they had screamed at countless would-be-victims whenever they left the safety of the group, ‘I’m going to find her. The portal brought me to a place that’s almost identical to where we were before, so that’s a start.’

‘You  _ better _ find her, Rhys, or I swear to god, I will-- _ ’ _

_ ‘ _ Maybe if we try the thing that Gortys did again? _ ’  _ Vaughn offers vaguely, managing to place himself on the holo between Sasha and the screen as she appears to be just-barely restraining the desire to punch Rhys’ face on it, ‘We know you’re alright, so we’ll track down Fiona, then call you back if we can. We’ll start working on a plan to find where you are and get you home. _ ’ _

Pandora; home. Not a possibility Rhys might have ever considered in his Hyperion days.For the longest time Pandora had been nothing more than a brown speck beneath him, a place of chaos and poverty. It was a planet of untrustworthy, dangerous people that Helios had thrown countless millions of dollars at over the years in the hopes they could somehow tame it. Handsome Jack might have gotten close but Pandora had beaten even him in the end, and yet now it had given Rhys a new purpose, a new life, and a new family.

‘Sounds good to me.’ He says, both to Vaughn’s suggestion and his own thoughts of where he now belongs. He cracks a smile - a smile of impossible, nervous hope. ‘Get back to me as soon as you can?’

‘Sure thing. And Rhys?’

‘Yeah, Vaughn?’

‘Love you, bro.’

‘Love you too, bro.’ He replies with a wink, grinning widely now. Rhys sees Sasha roll her eyes but she’s suppressing a smile too. ‘I’ll try and track her down first, but call me if you find Fiona, as soon as you do.’

He watches as Loader Bot gives him a brief wave before the signal cuts out, the holo projection from his arm flickering until it disappears. The silence which follows is deafening, and Rhys feels panic rising in his chest once more. What if they don’t find her? What if they can’t find him again either? Had he just willingly cut off his best chance of getting back?

The Guardians shift and begin to move further into the tunnel, sensing it is time for them to move on and Rhys follows mostly due to a lack of better options. He is very aware of the cool glass of the ECHO lens resting against his chest. Reaching into his shirt, he untucks it and examines it in quiet contemplation as he continues to tail the Guardians to a location unknown. The stone ground is hard and rough under the thin sock of his otherwise bare foot- he walks with a slight limp where his steps are now unbalanced, which would likely annoy him more if he didn’t already have so much on his mind. Somewhere out there were his friends, who now knew he was safe but still seemed to have no indication of just how far away he is from them and all he has for company are two mostly silent alien creatures and a relic of the past long quieted by his own hand. A part of him wonders in morbid fascination if Jack could see outwards from his prison with the ECHO eye, if he was watching Rhys now like some coded fly on the wall, albeit one no longer able to buzz incessantly in his head. At least he wasn’t alone like Fiona, wherever she was.

A faint glimmer to his left distracts Rhys’ gaze from the lens. It did not have the same luminescence as the Vault crystals around him; instead it seems to reflect the glow of the crystals on its dull surface. As he nears the strange object, squinting in the low light to make it out more clearly, the Guardians stop. As before one goes ahead further while the other remains near Rhys.

In bold lettering along one side of the odd shape are words Rhys might never have predicted to see so far from anything else familiar. He edges closer to be sure he is reading them right, but they remain the same on closer inspection- ATLAS MINING CORPS. The object appeared to be some part of a machine, and there are Vault crystals seemingly springing from it, like how weeds take over abandoned equipment or buildings. There are no discernible controls so Rhys guesses the rest of this lost machine must be buried deeper beneath the ground. It’s then that he notices the slight gradient to the floor outlined against the rusted metal- an angle so minuscule that simply walking upon the gradual slope had not revealed the change to him.

The Guardian nearest to Rhys makes an impatient clicking noise and taps its stick on the floor twice. Time to go, Rhys relents. He hurries along behind them now as their pace quickens from before. The slope soon becomes more evident until he struggles to conceal his quiet exerted panting. Paired with the slight hop to his step, caused by the cruel loss of a shoe, Rhys does not doubt he would be subject to endless ridicule if the others were here to tease him; his toes are cold, his ankles are sore, and he tries to ignore the distinct ache of hunger in his belly. When did he eat last? This morning? Doing battle with a Vault Monster on only one meal really was a dumb idea.

At the top of the incline a few metres ahead is an opening into what appears to be a dark cavern. The armed Guardian lifts a bony hand to stop Rhys in his tracks and the other once again goes on and enters the cavern. Seconds pass, then minutes. And then without a sound the Guardian remaining with Rhys steps aside, staring at him when he does not move.

‘Do I… go?’ Rhys asks, as if the Guardian would respond in a way he would understand. Unsurprisingly, it does not- instead it continues to focus solely on him, its strange glowing eyes trained directly on his face. He takes a step forward. No reaction. Another step. The creature keeps its vision fixed on him but does nothing more. Assuming that it is safe for him to continue, Rhys moves past the Guardian entirely and follows the second into the cavern. He is not followed, and ascends into the cavern alone.

Before him is a great plateau, stars shine like tiny pinpricks in the inky black above him, and Rhys almost feels a kind of vertigo from the sudden empty vastness after so long in sealed tunnels and poorly illuminated caves. Two moons glow over a range of mountains cutting a jagged edge across the night sky, like a pair of looming omnipresent eyeballs. The expansive view ahead momentarily distracts Rhys from the being directly in front of him- another Guardian, much taller than the one that  stood beside it, which proceeds to communicate with its companion in the same strange, alien sounds in a tone almost inaudible to Rhys until he notices their presence. At the second he takes in the sight of this creature - it appears to be wearing a mask of some sort - and immediately takes a step back, his hand hovers over the handle of his stun baton again. He was grateful that he had not required it earlier; he would have more charge to use should this being turn on him. The new Guardian seems less alarmed by this gesture than its fellows had been, however. Though the original Guardian tenses and readies the same pink balls of crackling energy in its palms once more, a wave from the taller being calls it off. The seemingly subordinate Guardian moves past Rhys and back into the tunnel from whence it came, leaving him alone with the taller masked alien.

A silence passes. Rhys stares at the Guardian and it stares right back. Rhys almost speaks, and he opens his mouth to say something along the lines of a comment on the weather when he is interrupted.

‘Hello, Vault Hunter.’ the Guardian says, in a voice which is seemingly female and which scares the crap out of Rhys. He visibly jumps and moves back, his hands startling up to his chest in a defensive move before he hurries to regain his composure.

‘You… You can talk?’ he says, wondering if the others from before were able to do so after all, and had instead chosen to ignore him. He was offended by the idea.

‘Well observed.’ the Guardian responds, seemingly amused by his reaction. It begins to step towards him but not directly; it starts to circle him, taking languid steps across the platform in a curving path. As it does, their surroundings begin to change. Pink flames rise along the rim of the mountain top and burn with no discernible fuel or source. Rocks break from the ground and rise into the air, turning and drifting, suspended with no clear purpose.

‘Who are you?’ Rhys asks, ‘Did you bring me here?’

‘Your kind have named me the Watcher. And yes, you are here on my order. I have a mission for you, Vault Hunter, and for your peers.’

‘A mission? What kind of mission?’ he asks as he and the Watcher remain opposite one another. As it takes a step, Rhys does too, eyeing the impressive staff-like weapon held in one of its hands. He contemplates once again making a size envy joke, and once again suppresses it. Just barely.

‘War is coming. And you will need all the Vault Hunters you can get.’ 

Of all the things Rhys might have expected to discover when finally opening a Vault, the announcement of war was not something he could have predicted. War with who? Most of the corporations on Pandora were scrambling to pick up where Hyperion had fallen - himself and Atlas included. Did it mean a turf war or something else, something bigger that he was unaware of? He senses from the gravity of the creature’s tone that it is the latter case.

‘I spoke to Athena. Lilith. Brick. Mordecai.’ the Watcher continues, undeterred when Rhys shows brief signs of recognition, ‘All of them are Vault Hunters like you. They know now that there is a threat looming, a threat which my people- the Eridians, could not defeat Ourselves. We created what you call Vault Monsters as extensions of Our own guardianship. Their power - a combination of Our many gifts - was intended to safeguard the weapons and the wealth of Eridium found here so that one day others worthy of them might end what We started.’

‘Others worthy… You mean Vault Hunters?’ Rhys replies, quickly adding ‘Like me?’

The Watcher nods. ‘But just as the others have, you must pass a test. Humanity have proved itself tenacious and determined to survive despite your inferior forms and lacking technology. There is a chance - a slim one, but a chance nonetheless - that humanity may succeed where the Eridians have failed.’

Rhys stops entirely when the Watcher lifts a hand. He feels something small shift under his shirt, against his chest, and he drops his eyes to watch the ECHO lens drift upwards from inside his clothes. The lens hovers gently in front of his face as both he and the Watcher examine it; Rhys swears that he sees a pair of eyes staring out at him from within it for a moment, before realising - though still unnerved by the thought - that they are the reflection of his own. 

‘You fear this thing that you carry, when it was once a piece of you. Why?’

Rhys sighs, trying and failing to relieve the tension that has made nearly every muscle in his body taut. ‘Do you know what it is?’

‘I know what it contains. Why would you carry that which you fear more than anything?’

‘I ask myself the same damn question all the time.’ Rhys murmurs, before raising his voice to reply properly, ‘It’s supposed to be a reminder. Jack was brilliant, driven… but he was insane. Too proud. Convinced he was a hero when really that isn’t something you decide for yourself to be. I’m afraid that I… that I might become him in time if I don’t remind myself every day of what he became.’

He finds himself wondering why he opens up so easily to the Watcher. Once upon a time he would have worshipped the ground that Jack walked (or spat) on, just like the countless other Hyperion lackeys who worked for the man both before and after his death. Now he haunted the nightmares of Rhys, Vaughn, and everyone else who made it out of the flaming wreckage of Helios in mostly one piece. But Rhys never spoke about it with Vaughn or anyone else. The closest before now that he had come to opening up about Handsome Jack’s lingering hold on him was when Fiona had asked him about the lens.

And now here he is, on what he is pretty sure is a planet far from Pandora, with an ancient creature using its telekinetic power to prompt him into pouring his heart out to it. 

‘You fear this Jack?’ the Watcher prods, ‘Would you say he is your greatest fear?’

Rhys scoffs. ‘Oh yeah. Beyond dying a slow and painful death at the hands of a Psycho who wants to turn my face into a skin pizza, or getting poisoned by one of the weird plants in the biodome because- I don’t know, I got the urge to eat one of them? Or… No. Becoming Jack is up there. Definitely up there.’

And as Rhys finishes his admission of what is only a small portion of his innumerable fears, now questioning even more why he speaks so freely in the presence of the Watcher, he sees the ECHO eye lens glimmering in the palm of the Guardian. He stares in silent confusion, lifting his hand to snatch numbly for the chain which no longer hangs there. The Watcher brings the lens up to its masked face, allowing it to slowly circle on the end of its silver chain before dropping it to the ground and crushing it beneath its foot.

‘You talk a lot.’ the Watcher announces as Rhys feels as if the whole mountain begins to shake under his feet. He falls to his knees, landing on his palms and trying to keep himself upright as the Watcher nears him. ‘You must use that to your advantage now. Good luck, Vault Hunter.’

Rhys didn’t think he could be more afraid after that mysterious message but then the Watcher dissipates into dust and a firm hand clenches on his shoulder, wrenching a cry of pain from his lips.

‘Oh ho, cupcake. You’re in deep shit now. Did ya miss me?’


	11. Ascend

‘How could anyone leave so much stuff here?’ Fiona mutters aloud as she wanders from crate to crate inside what she had at first assumed was a mining base, leaving behind her a trail of puddles and watery footprints. But why would a mining base need this many guns? And grenades. And riot gear?

Regardless of who left it,why, and when- a lot of the guns are the same kind that Sasha usually freaks out over and that means they’re good. Fiona admires one firearm in particular; a slim and shiny rifle with the Atlas logo emblazoned along the side. She manages to work out the right ammo for her wrist pistol to fill every pocket she has. You know, just in case.

There are canned goods and preserved food - plus the blackened remnants of what might have been a ham salad sandwich years ago - and a few stained coffee mugs, but along with the opened weapon crates and abandoned edibles, it seems whoever was here made sure to evacuate in a hurry. There’s no sign of anyone having been here all that recently, which extinguishes the small flickering hope Fiona had that she and Rhys might have ended up in the same place after all; at least the patch of what  _ might  _ be dried blood on the wall isn’t likely to be his. Not for the first time in the last few minutes (or has it been hours?) she feels alone. 

And that’s when the floor begins to shake.

Snatching up the silver rifle with a box of bullets for it, Fiona dashes back out of the facility, stumbling out into the cold night air and watching in awe as one of the peaks close to her burns in bright pink flame like a giant candle. Suddenly she hears a scream of pain in a voice so familiar that it sends a chill of panic down her spine, the relief of knowing that voice subdued entirely by the countless reasons she is hearing it.

‘I’m coming!’ she shouts, spotting a path that should take her directly up to the flaming peak, and her voice carries over the crash of crumbling stone and shattering of long lost mining equipment as the ground quakes beneath her racing feet. Pink lightning sparks at the mountain top from no discernible cloud. This time there is no scream, no cry of pain. Only the shuddering rock as the earth tears itself apart. 


	12. Confrontation

Rhys has no air left in his body with which to shout as his back slams into a wall of rock, a fist clenched in a vice grip around his throat.

‘I asked you a question you stupid, worthless sack of shit- did you miss me?’ Jack spits, only it’s not Handsome Jack as Rhys knew him - the Vault mark burned into his face glows a harsh Eridium pink and his mismatched green and blue eyes stare with a light so bright that Rhys would be blinded by them if he wasn’t already seeing stars, bringing a whole new meaning to the phrase ‘burning glare’. Rhys’ long legs flap helplessly as he fights to breathe but he feels like his wind pipe is being crushed under a ring of stone. His stun baton, which he used only moments ago to try and take Jack on, lies only a few yards away, snapped into pieces as easily as one would break apart a stick.

Jack then hurls him away, his limp body dragging across the rough surface. Rhys has no fight left in him and he gasps pathetically for breath, managing to flinch just enough that a bolt of magenta lightning crackles inches away from him rather than directly on his chest.

‘I don’t get it, Rhys. I finally get to choke you- finally get to see your eyes bulging out of your stupid head as I squeeze the pathetic excuse for life out of you- but it’s not enough. I’m  _ disappointed _ . Can you believe it?’ Jack sighs, striding over to Rhys and kicking him hard in the gut. He doubles over and coughs, hacking on the little bit of air he struggles to draw into his deprived lungs as Jack continues with a growing malicious grin. ‘I want to tear you apart, see you bleeding and sobbing and  _ begging  _ me to stop, before I finally kill you, Rhysie. And I’m getting  _ such _ a hard on just thinking about it. Man, I can’t wait to get started.’

With Rhys unable to fight back, Jack reaches down and yanks him up by his prosthetic arm, giving the limb an experimental tug before wrenching it forcefully. It snaps at the elbow and dislocates the joint it’s connected to - Rhys howls in agony and collapses, his legs buckling under him, and his face meeting Jack’s knee in the fall, very definitely breaking his nose. His ruined cybernetic arm is crushed beneath him as he lands, wrenching another strangled cry from his lips.

Jack laughs - a demented, joyful howl of glee as Rhys lays on the ground and whimpers at his feet. ‘This is too easy! You’ve got nothing in you, kid? No punches? Not even a shitty comeback? Now I really am disappointed. Were you not paying attention the whole time I was rattling around in that pretty head of yours, huh?’

‘I was… paying attention.’ Rhys coughs, ‘You manipulated me. You lied to me, in my own… In my own head, for weeks. You used me.’

‘Damn right I used you! And it required so little effort on my part! Poor widdle code monkey, finally getting to meet his idol and then getting screwed over by him.’ Jack says, his lips pouted to accentuate his words as he mimics rubbing at tears on his cheeks, ‘Boo-fucking-hoo, sweet cheeks. At least you came out on top in the end, right? At least you didn’t fucking die.  _ Twice. _ ’

‘Always had to do... one better than… everyone else.’

‘Excuse me?!’ Jack exclaims, with a surprised huff, ‘Was that a dig, Rhysie? At me? Brave- real brave. Stupid- but hey, bravery and stupidity are the same thing, right?’

That gets Rhys another swift kick to the gut. He curls in on himself and spits blood. ‘You’d know.’ He mutters.

‘I really would stop about now if I were you.’ Jack replies, leaning down to leer in his face, ‘This is only gonna get worse. If you do as Daddy says, I’ll at least let it all be over sooner. How’s that sound?’

‘Go fuck yourself.’ Rhys manages to raise his head and spit again, a crimson glob of spit and blood splattering against Jack’s cheek. It rolls down his face, over the pulsing pink scar, before dripping onto the ground from his jawline. A moment passes where Jack stares at Rhys in an almost impressed disbelief. Then his mouth contorts to another grin.

‘Oh, you’ve really messed up now, cupcake.’ 

Large fingers enclose around Rhys’ remaining arm and haul him onto his back before a familiar sneaker plants itself upon his chest and pushes down. He still has no strength to fight back as Jack presses harder and harder on his ribs, his teeth too white against the ashen grey of his skin and the stark glow of his eyes and scar. Rhys lifts his flesh arm to bat and punch at the leg pinning him to the ground to no avail - Jack only adds more weight to it and Rhys feels his ribs start to bruise under the unrelenting pressure.

The weight lifts and for a cruelly blissful second, Rhys can breathe again. Then the foot which previously pinned his chest slams down on the side of his face, catching his already bloody nose. He grunts, tasting more copper on his tongue as an alert in his ECHO eye finally flashes up diagnostics on his arm.  _ 11% remaining power.  _ He’d guessed that from the fact that he couldn’t move it.

‘Nothing to say? No more smart remarks, kiddo?’ Jack mocks him, using the tip of his foot to turn Rhys’ face face up. ‘And I thought we were just getting started. It must be pretty shitty not having your lame friends here to save your ass, huh? Reminds you just how pathetic you are, doesn’t it?’

‘At least I… I…’

‘What?’

‘...at least I have… friends.’

‘There it is! That plucky charm that I hate so much!’ Jack crows and lifts his foot to slam it down onto Rhys when his head explodes in a blast of rock and dust. Rhys scrambles back and his eyes dart to a shadowed figure standing on the very edge of the mountain top, their clothes smoking from contact with the fire which encircles it.

‘Fiona?’ Rhys murmurs, having to blink through his own blood to make her out in the darkness, ‘Is that… Is that you?’

‘Rhys.’ Fiona says his name in a tone flooded with relief and she hurries over to him and kneels beside him, dropping the rifle she’d looted which was still warm from the shot at whatever the hell that thing had been. She’d heard its voice and she really didn’t want to know.

‘You’re okay.’ he murmurs, ‘Sasha… She’s not gonna… kill me.’

‘Not looking like this, she won’t. Maybe once we’ve fixed you up- she’d feel less guilty about it then.’ Fiona replies then processes what Rhys just said and blinks down at him, ‘Wait. Did you speak to her?’

‘Yeah, they… They called me. From Helios. Fiona, we’re--’

‘Not in Kansas anymore.’ she says, either ignoring or not noticing the confused expression which forms on Rhys’ beaten face. She helps him to his feet with minimal complaining and carefully guides him over to a shelf so he can rest.

‘Why are you all wet?’

‘It’s kinda a long story.’ Fina huffs, ‘Or rather a part of one, judging by how today has played out so far.’

‘Did I pass?’ he asks, once he has regained a little of his breath. ‘The test. Is it over?’

Fiona is about to reply with a question of her own when someone from behind her answers Rhys and a faint whirring signals the charge of the rifle she had left on the ground.

‘Far from it, kids. Did you actually think that one tiny bullet was gonna end this, after all the shit I’ve been through? Not even close.’

Fiona turns, Rhys peering around her and starting to wish he hadn’t, as Jack rolls his neck to realign the cracks in the stone along his throat. He aims the gun at Fiona who throws both herself and Rhys to the floor in the last possible second, Jack’s shot ricocheting off the rock where Rhys had just been sitting. 

Rolling to her feet, Fiona aims her wrist pistol at Jack. ‘Why can’t you just stay dead, you arrogant son of a bitch?’

‘Because I’m the hero, baby. Heroes never die.’ Jack responds, throwing away the rifle and allowing it to skid far enough to balance precariously at the cliff edge. He laughs as both Rhys and Fiona’s gaze flit to it. ‘I dare you. Go ahead, punk. Make my day.’

Fiona feels a hand on her arm. She turns and helps Rhys stand as Jack watches, a growing smile of amusement on his features as the young man sways on his feet and uses the sleeve of his shirt to mop some of the blood from his face. His brown and yellow eyes meet Jack’s confident blue and green ones with steely determination that any lesser man might flinch under the scrutiny of. 

‘Do you think Angel was a hero too, because I heard what  _ really _ happened, Jack.’ Rhys demands.

Jack visibly freezes up. The light in his heterochromic eyes flickers for a moment, and the amused smirk disappears abruptly. ‘What did you say?’ He demands.

‘Do you think your daughter was a hero? You know, the one you forced into charging a Vault key as your enslaved Eridium battery before she was put out of her misery by strangers who showed her more kindness and mercy than you’ve ever offered to her in your life? She died, Jack. She died because of  _ you _ .’

‘I was keeping her safe!’ Jack shouts but he seems rooted to the spot, unable or unwilling to cross the distance though his fists tighten at his sides. ‘It was too dangerous for her anywhere else. I needed her and I protected her because I loved her!’

‘It’s not like you to feel the urge to explain yourself, Jack.’ Rhys replies, an eerie calm over him as he steps ahead of Fiona and places himself between her and their opponent, ‘It almost seems like you agree with me.’

‘And what about Nisha?’ Fiona joins in and takes a stand beside Rhys, ‘Everyone on Pandora knows the story of the Sheriff of Lynchwood. She was killed by the same people who went on to kill your daughter - or rather, who freed her from you - and your reaction to her death? To the murder of the woman who loved you?’

Jack shouts wordlessly and sends a handful of pink lightning at Fiona and Rhys, but it’s fired in clumsy anger and the bolts crackle around them but miss their intended targets. The pair remain undeterred by this display of power.

‘Like you know anything about it! I couldn’t let them see that I was… It doesn’t matter! I still won. They opened the Vault, just like I wanted. I got the Eridium and they only beat me in the end because--’

‘Because Angel, the daughter you enslaved, helped them.’ Rhys cuts him off, ‘Because she let them kill her to finish you too.’

‘And when you came back, when Rhys was carrying you around like the puppet you wanted, as nothing more than a data packet, you didn’t even know what you’d done.’ Fiona adds, and she supports Rhys’ weight as they both advance on Jack, ‘Now you do. Now you know that you were never the hero at all…’

‘You’re a monster.’ Rhys finishes. Silence hangs over the three of them like a storm cloud and the light of the two moons seems to have dulled. Jack lifts his hand to his face, the energy of the Eridium which sustains him crackling between his fingers.

‘I died. Twice.’ he murmurs, ‘Fucking bandits shoot me in the head after I nearly succeed in making Pandora a paradise. And then some obsessed whack job makes an AI of me and leaves me on the same freak show of a planet that was almost mine before I get carted around in your thick skull. Then I get trapped- in a  _ freaking ECHO eye -  _ and then get shoved into some super-powered body, only to be  _ talked down _ by you losers.’

He turns to Rhys and Fiona again and this time he is smiling almost serenely. ‘I’m going on my own terms this time. And fuck me, I am  _ not  _ coming back. Ever. I swear to god, if I don’t get to stay in Hell and rot in it this time, I am gonna be pissed.’

Jack looks to his own hand once more, the energy contained within his palm sparking more and more fiercely. Rhys seems to realise what he is about to do and finds himself lurching forward, as if he might stop him, as if he wanted to. But Jack covers his face with his hand and screams, smoke rising from the Vault scar on his face as it burns through him. Cracks break all across his body, his form splintering and cracking from the energy contained within it. Suddenly the shape of Jack explodes, sending out shards of Eridium and bursts of stone  from the epicentre until nothing remains of him but glowing crystals and broken shards.

‘I think we did it.’ Fiona says. She and Rhys both stare at the space Jack once occupied, at the debris left where he once stood.

‘You did.’ the Watcher says, appearing beside them. Fiona draws her pistol again but Rhys waves her down. ‘You both passed. We had a unique test devised for you, but you passed this one together. I think We can allow that.’

‘So can we go back now? Back to Pandora?’ Rhys asks. ‘You did bring us here after all.’

‘I can. And I will.’ the Watcher responds. It waves a hand calmly - as the flames around the mountain top flicker and die out, stone breaks off from the ground to form a gate much like the one both of them had run through after the battle with the Traveler. Through the golden sheen within it they can see the plateau on Pandora, the remains of the Vault monster still scattered across the ground and Helios lit up in the night. 

Fiona loops her arm around Rhys’ - the one which has not been snapped in half - and allows him to lean on her. ‘Thanks, I guess? For… whatever is happening.’

‘I’ll explain on the way back.’ Rhys promises, ‘It’s… probably gonna take a while.’


End file.
